SpudmanWP wrote:How so? They are not going to buy a whole jet for just the sake of the radar's mfg.

Besides, Raytheon has plenty of other radar customers to keep them busy.

I wasn't saying it was corporate welfare to Raytheon, just pointing out that if upgrading the legacy Hornets is corporate welfare, it would not be Boeing (air frame) but rather Raytheon (radar upgrade) it was targeted to. No one is buying new jets, so Boeing doesn't benefit (at least not very much), but Raytheon does since they are buying the radars from them.

SpudmanWP wrote:How so? They are not going to buy a whole jet for just the sake of the radar's mfg.

Besides, Raytheon has plenty of other radar customers to keep them busy.

I wasn't saying it was corporate welfare to Raytheon, just pointing out that if upgrading the legacy Hornets is corporate welfare, it would not be Boeing (air frame) but rather Raytheon (radar upgrade) it was targeted to. No one is buying new jets, so Boeing doesn't benefit (at least not very much), but Raytheon does since they are buying the radars from them.

Wouldn't the old radar's free up spares for the AV-8B+ birds? Also would not be surprised if these radars ended up at Fallon when retired from USMC. Equipping the aggressor aircraft with AESA would allow them to simulate the later model Sukois. Of course it could just end up providing LRU's and T/R Modules for the Super Hornet fleet.

Corsair1963 wrote:Considering contractors are taking over more and more of the Aggressor Role. I wouldn't be surprised of some of the APG-79 equipped Hornets end up in their hands.

While it is true that contract adversary support is on the rise, the ceiling they face is what technology the state department will allow to be sold on the civilian/private market. Every one of their jets (be it ATAC, Draken, etc) has an FAA registration and N-number, and an experimental airworthiness certificate.........yes they are technically considered "public" aircraft for administrative purposes/FAA oversight while actually flying a red support flight, but that doesn't change the fact that they are privately owned aircraft with no actual relationship to the military other than a contract. So they have basically the same legal status as your neighbor Bob who might just want to buy a super hornet because he feels like it, and might also want to then just remove avionics, crate them, and send them to Russia/China for some cash. Yes, I trust the contract folks to protect such stuff if it were to come to that, but legally, they are exactly the same buyer. They currently fly a boat load of old, technologically irrelevant jets (i.e. KFIR, modified A-4, Mk58 Hunter, etc) because they can't legally buy anything else. There are bids to get slightly newer aircraft, such as Mirage F1 and F-16A, but I still haven't seen it happen. Even then, we aren't really talking about representative threat aircraft. But that is a long way of saying that its gonna be a long time or possibly never when they can buy an F/A-18A, let alone an AESA Rhino......not to mention that there are literally 0 APG-79 jets that we can spare at this point.

If we're talking about a paradigm shift to primarily BVR air to air combat, how is that served by flying Alpha jets, KFIR's, F-5's and A-4's? Further, can any of these aircraft come close to simulating the BVR capabilities of an SU-35, J-10 or a J-20? Because those are the worst case scenario confronting our pilots, and it would make sense to train for worst case - in jiu jitsu to air to air combat.

Unless these new F-16's are coming replete with powerful AESA's, I just can't see it. Even then, the size of the radar you can jam into the nose of an F-16, F-5 etc pales in comparison to something like an F-15. Do we not have some low mileage F-15's in the boneyard that could be retrofitted with AESA's?

It's not going to be cheap, but if we're going to devote 80% of the training to BVR and 20% to WVR it would seem that's what would need to transpire. Or am I missing something, where these mostly 3rd gen jets can replicate a Flanker?

mixelflick wrote:If we're talking about a paradigm shift to primarily BVR air to air combat, how is that served by flying Alpha jets, KFIR's, F-5's and A-4's? Further, can any of these aircraft come close to simulating the BVR capabilities of an SU-35, J-10 or a J-20? Because those are the worst case scenario confronting our pilots, and it would make sense to train for worst case - in jiu jitsu to air to air combat.

Unless these new F-16's are coming replete with powerful AESA's, I just can't see it. Even then, the size of the radar you can jam into the nose of an F-16, F-5 etc pales in comparison to something like an F-15. Do we not have some low mileage F-15's in the boneyard that could be retrofitted with AESA's?

It's not going to be cheap, but if we're going to devote 80% of the training to BVR and 20% to WVR it would seem that's what would need to transpire. Or am I missing something, where these mostly 3rd gen jets can replicate a Flanker?

Those are IMO very good questions.If my memory doesn't fail me, I remember to have read somewhere about something that IMO replies your questions.

The shorter answer is: You can simulate an Alpha jet, KFIR, F-5 or A-4 as a Su-35, this "system wise".

The longer answer which also replies to the question "How?" coming from the reply above is if I'm not mistaken something like this: Since nowadays combat aircraft are fitted with (complex) software suites you can model stuff such as simulated BVR missile shots, this despite none of the aircraft above (Alpha jet, KFIR, F-5 or A-4) carries such missiles in real life. And since this is all software, you can model "whatever missile" you want.Regarding the lack of radar or the lack of a powerful radar (powerful enough for meaningful BVR radar detection range) by the aircraft above, there's also other ways to model such capability (for example an F-5 having the "Su-35 radar") by other means supported again by software. These means (again if I'm not mistaken) could be for example a data-link target information about a "Blue Force" aircraft that could be sent by ground stations (for example) to a "Red Force Su-35" - in reality a F-5 for example - when it is within the supposed Su-35 radar detection range (against the "Blue Force" aircraft). Another alternative for this could be for example that Blue Force aircraft carry their transponders always on (Mode 3/A IFF for example) but the systems onboard the "Red Force" aircraft will only show the interrogated "Blue Force" aircraft when they are within the detection range of the simulated radar (again and for example, a simulated Su-35 radar).

Such solution IMO allows:- Having a much cheaper (to adquire and maintain) "Red Force" fleet than having for example F-15s (or even an F-16s) modeling for example Su-35s.- You can model pretty accurately BVR combat. Curiously more accurately than using the same aircraft (Alpha jet, KFIR, F-5 or A-4) to model WVR/Dogfight combat.

A 4th/4.5th gen fighter aircraft stands about as much chance against a F-35 as a guns-only Sabre has against a Viper.

mixelflick wrote:If we're talking about a paradigm shift to primarily BVR air to air combat, how is that served by flying Alpha jets, KFIR's, F-5's and A-4's? Further, can any of these aircraft come close to simulating the BVR capabilities of an SU-35, J-10 or a J-20? Because those are the worst case scenario confronting our pilots, and it would make sense to train for worst case - in jiu jitsu to air to air combat....

'ricnunes' has provided a good reply whilst not mentioning LVC which was not mentioned in the 6 page PDF above because the article was about ADAIR. LVC is LIVE VIRTUAL CONSTRUCTIVE which now 'ricnunes' has explained in his own way. There are threads in this forum about LVC so search is your friend however one may find that difficult with only three letters. So using LVC* does not get many hits one may use 'constructive' or combinations of words for a lot more. This is one example:

"...The LVC demonstration included:• A live Aero L-29 jet trainer with the JSAS equipment onboard, emulating a 5th-Gen F-35 fighter, operated by the University of Iowa Operator Performance Lab (OPL) in Iowa